The bazaar of opinion

GUJRANWALA: This is with reference to Khurram Husain’s article “The bazaar of opinion” (July 15). Any and every policy discussion on talk shows is essentially a mindless shout-a-thon conducted by self-styled experts and indignant anchors. Further, there is an infuriating tendency to make numbers and percentages up to add credibility to their nonsense. Whether it’s economic policy, security, social issues or entertainment, it’s all rooted in the bigotry or politics of the anchors and experts. Mr Husain mentions how an anchor, holding a child in her lap, conducted an awful, baseless and hypocritical discussion on the matter without every putting anything in context and literally pulling up numbers and percentages from whence the sun doesn’t shine. It’s a pity that most media personnel do not care for facts, reason or ethics when it comes to reporting, conducting talk shows or analysing a situation.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 18^th, 2010.